Wednesday, January 1, 2014

Ferry Plaza Farmers Market in San Francisco

The Ferry Plaza Farmers Market in San Francisco is one of the top farmer's markets in the U.S.A, offering a wide variety of fresh farm produce and artisan food.

The market is open 3 days a week (Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays) but it's best to visit the Saturday market as it's much larger and is held both in front of the Ferry Building Marketplace and the rear plaza overlooking the Bay.

From the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market Website:

The markets offer fruits, vegetables, herbs, flowers, meats and eggs from small regional farmers and ranchers, many of whom are certified organic. A wealth of other products include regional artisan specialties such as breads, cheeses and jams. The Thursday market features an array of artisan street food: wood-fired pizza, grilled meats, sandwiches, and tacos, while the Saturday market also includes local restaurants serving a variety of hot, delicious meals.

Inside the Ferry Building Marketplace, you can find the more established artisan food purveyors:

Blue Bottle Coffee

Blue Bottle Coffee has grown to a small network of cafes and is the brainchild of a slightly disaffected freelance musician and coffee lunatic, weary of the grande eggnog latte and the double skim pumpkin-pie macchiato. He opened a roaster for people who are clamoring for the actual taste of freshly roasted coffee. Using a miniscule six-pound batch roaster, he makes an historic vow: “I will only sell coffee less than 48 hours out of the roaster to my customers, so they may enjoy coffee at its peak of flavor."

Acme Bread

The Acme Bread Company started in 1983 to bake bread for restaurants and stores who wanted to offer better bread than was generally available on the wholesale market at the time. It's one of the pioneers of the San Francisco Bay Area's "Bread Revolution", which in turn created the modern "artisan bread" movement in America, and remains a "benchmark" for commercial handmade bread.

Cowgirl Creamery Artisan Cheese is a full-service, European style cheese shop offering Cowgirl Creamery’s own cheeses and artisan farmstead cheese from some of the most distinguished cheesemakers in America and Europe. Staff are all highly trained and the shop carries tools such as knives, books and cheese boards, and has a selection of cheese accompaniments including local jams and honeys, local crackers, and cured meats.

Cowgirl Creamery Sidekick

Cowgirl Sidekick, is a cheese and dairy bar, next to the Cowgirl Creamery cheese shop in the Ferry Building Marketplace. The kitchen offers a morning menu that includes challah rolls with sweet and savory fillings, gougères, cottage cheese with fresh fruit, and sweet and savory yogurt bowls.gougères, cottage cheese
with fresh fruit, and sweet and savory yogurt bowls. Lunch time includes a
fresh mozzarella bar, green salads, a daily artisan cheese plate, cheese soup,
cheese toasties, and grilled cheese

The Slanted Door, a modern Vietnamese restaurant in the Ferry Building Marketplace also comes highly recommended. Chef Charles Phan's food, using organic produce and ecologically farmed meat, has been nationally lauded as the pinnacle of Asian cuisine. Diners often line up early, eagerly waiting for The Slanted Door to open.

If food's not your thing, maybe the view of the San Francisco- Oakland Bay Bridge from the Ferry Building Marketplace might cheer you up.

Ferry Plaza Farmers Market is located at One Ferry Building San Francisco, California. For more information, click here.